For Whom the Homeless Wander
by N3mesis
Summary: The benevolent Courier encounters many who would help her in her travels, though only a select few can really claim the right of being considered her "family." This 'fic focuses on her relationships with the followers she comes to have in her journeys across the Mojave (but likely very heavy on Boone and Veronica. May focus on others, [can only list 4] but they are my favorites.)
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note: Hi, all! I've written only Star Wars fics, but this has been in my head a while, and writing these seems to be fun for writing practice. Let me know if you like it.**

**Also, keep in mind that, despite having some liberal profanity and racism written in here, the opinions, words, and actions of my characters are just that: of my characters. They don't reflect my opinions or perceptions in any way, and I won't use these devices unless I feel they are a reflection of the character or the plot. I do not mean to use them tastelessly or wantonly, and I will only use them when I think the situation in the world of my characters demands it. (I just thought it would be interesting to evaluate how a Chinese person would likely be received by strangers in a post-apocalyptic Vegas, especially since, according to "lore" Sino-American relations were so bad before the culmination of the Great War. I imagine it would be...unkind.)**

**That being said, I hope you enjoy the first of hopefully many Fallout installments. If you have any comments, concerns, or criticisms, I welcome them if you give them to me kindly and respectfully. But, enough of that. Enjoy!**

* * *

><p>There used to be a time when she thought she was really beautiful. She had never been vain, not really, but she was proud of her origins and her ethnicity. Being Chinese in the Mojave was a rare thing. Hell, being Chinese anywhere in the New California Republic was.<p>

It didn't matter anymore, she guessed. That time had come and gone.

She stared at the sullied water beneath the dinosaur statue, flinching every now and then as the tattered remains of her resolve stared back at her resolutely through her image.

She had the surefire physical characteristics of being Chinese. Straight, jet black hair that was darkest on her head, a flatter face and small, thin nose. Her cheekbones were wideset under her eyes, full, overreaching her mouth just slightly into two plumper cheeks. This was a "westerner" quality her village had once commended her for. Maybe it was why she'd been deemed so beautiful. She didn't know. Her mouth was wide, concealing a huge smile that sheltered an array of strong, white teeth. Her skin was dark, and her eyes, curved in just slightly nearest her nose, tilted upwards just slightly at the end.

Yes, there was once a time in which she thought she would have been called beautiful. Her mother had told her this; though, to her mother's credit, this was the job of most mothers. Good mothers, anyway. _She_ would likely have said it to _her_ children, if she had any.

This made her feel pinched all over again, but she just stared, tight-lipped, tight-chested into her reflection, eyeing her features with anthropological disdain for the first time in what felt like a very long time. It was strange how a person's perception of themselves could change.

Being beautiful didn't really seem important anymore. There were other things that mattered more now.

And her mother and father had taught her almost all of them.

The ability to run very long distances was a plus. This was a skill she had. Her father had taken her out from a very early age to go on very long runs to build up her endurance. The ability to drop everything and abandon it in an attempt to flee, also a plus. Their village, if you could even call it that, was forever in motion. Sometimes, getting up and leaving in the middle of the night was absolutely necessary. This was also a skill she possessed. The ability to listen quietly when others spoke, she had. That, her mother had drilled into her. Listening was an important facet of the old ways. The ability to watch her surroundings – also in her arsenal. Her mother, also, had taught her this.

But there were certain things her family would never have been able to teach her.

The ability to shoot a man in the head from a mile away, her most valuable asset. She'd learned she'd had that capacity only after everyone she'd known had died. She'd learned how to treat blunt force trauma, how to utilize and apply a tourniquet, what and when and how to press into wounds to ensure that the wounded wouldn't die – that she'd also learned outside of her home.

Not that she really had a home anymore. She'd come to know that the only people who really had these kinds of qualities didn't really have homes. They were more or less homeless.

That was where all her so-called beauty and skills got her.

Homeless.

She was now so homeless, utterly homeless, more homeless than she had ever been, that she wasn't quite sure what to do or where to go or how to think. And it was in times like these, hiding out from the rain in some backwater Mojave settlement called Novac, hiding under the ass-end of a T-Rex statue, that this realization was felt with particular acuteness.

She heard footsteps coming closer to her, and she stood tall, placing frigid palms against long-since aged plastic to ground her to reality. A man came around the corner, obviously seeking to get out of the rain, and she receded as far into the dinosaur as she could, not wanting to be seen.

He wore a red, tattered beret, but that obviously didn't keep him any drier than anybody else because his white shirt, a little tight and stained from sweat and the wear and tear of living in the Mojave appeared to be soaked through. This showed off his stellar physique, but she couldn't be less interested. He was tall, had some kind of weapon slung around behind him, and he wore sunglasses – even though it was still early enough in the morning to be too dark to see.

This seemed ridiculous to her, but then again, what was ridiculous in this day and age?

"Yo, Boone! Where'd you head off to?" a voice from above called.

The man with the white shirt ducked closer to the dinosaur.

Boone, she presumed.

"Yo, you dip out early, man? What's with that?"

Still, the man with the dirty white shirt ducked closer to the statue, eyes up towards the direction of the voice, as if poised to be discovered at any moment. She, too, chose not to move, not wanting to be seen. It would happen eventually, the man had to be either totally sloshed or high off his rocker not to notice her, but that didn't mean it had to happen right away.

Time passed, but the rain didn't, and the man finally relaxed against the yellowing yellowed dinosaur statue as the voice who'd sought after him lost interest. After a few moments, obviously under the assumption that he was alone, the man glanced over his shoulder to his right around a corner she couldn't see and withdrew a long needle from a thigh-pocket.

A blue liquid was inside, clear and pure. There were tiny letters on the plastic: Med-X. Highly potent, very effective. A painkiller of some kind - she knew what was in pure medicine, but that was hard to come by these days. Who knew what was really in that syringe?

She surveyed him for injuries and saw that he had none. She waited for him to draw the injuries from his person, waited for him to perhaps lift a sleeve or drop trou to reveal some kind of scar in which he could apply the medicine directly. He didn't. In fact, based on the way he was continually glancing over his shoulder, based on the unsteady, somewhat ungraceful lurching of his hands, it looked as if he didn't _physically _need the painkiller at all.

He flexed his left arm and she saw that the area of interest in which his vein ran most easily was uninjured. No tell tale signs of being a junky. No bruising, no scarring, no swelling. The area looked clear.

So the man was in some kind of pain.

This wasn't the way, she thought, and the medic in her couldn't remain quiet anymore.

"Unless you're hurt, that's just not a good idea," she said calmly, as non-judgmentally as she could.

The man jumped, slamming his head into the dinosaur, swearing prolifically, albeit in hushed, angry whispers, as he rubbed his head where contact had been made. The syringe dropped to the ground, and the precariously held liquid inside seeped out with the tiniest tinkling of shattered glass.

_Syringes these days_, she thought, a little guiltily, glancing up into the man's sunglasses.

He just glared at her with more hatred than she would have anticipated.

"What the fuck would you know about it, chink?" he snapped, scowling, driving the toe of his right boot into the now-destroyed analgesic.

The racial slur was nothing new – in fact, it was quite predictable. It wasn't cool or shocking. Just made him sound and look as desperate as his behavior obviously was.

She felt sorry for him.

Leaning forward, she bridged the space between them slightly. He stiffened, as if she was physically repulsive.

This, too, wasn't new.

_Old news, pal_, she thought to herself.

"I was a doctor once," she offered him as kindly as she could. "Served with a unit."

"Then what are you doing skulking around here?" he asked. "Not like any fucking soldier I've ever known."

She nodded, smiling unaffectedly, as if his rudeness was commonplace.

"Yes, I suppose you're right," she finally offered. "Though I'm no soldier."

"I thought you just said –"

"You assumed," she continued inscrutably. "But I can understand your confusion. I was obviously unclear. Sorry."

There was a silence between them. She could sense from his demeanor that he was in an incredible amount of social agony. That was unkind of her, she realized, and she nodded her head lightly, just the way her mother taught her to do. It was not the full bow from the shoulders she'd afforded elders or other important people from her village, but that couldn't be helped. All in all, he was a foreigner to her culture, and tradition could only carry so far when dealing with foreigners.

"Don't fucking bow at me," the man called Boone snapped at her viciously.

"Very well then," she said to him, standing taller. "I apologize if I have caused you some discomfort. Though, your racist attitude does you no credit."

"Where the fuck did you even come from?" he asked her, eyes narrowing behind his tinted glasses. "And what are you doing under here so late?"

She smiled at the use of his terminology.

"It is very early in the morning," she commented, glancing up at the gray sky. "As for the matter of my being here, I didn't see the need to involve anybody, but I needed to rest, and I wanted to stay dry. I found this spot, and I thought it would do nicely. It seemed safe, dry, and solitary."

"Yeah, well, squatters aren't allowed in Novac," he spat aggressively. "You could be Legion. How are we supposed to know?"

She stiffened, and for the first time, she couldn't hide it.

This was the first time being outside of the Legion that anybody had mentioned it to her directly. She should have expected it, but somehow she hadn't. It felt like a different time. A different life. Like she'd died and been reborn. That was how it had felt when her village had been raided too, how it felt as she watched her father and mother get picked off by the very heathens who would then take her in.

"I'm not Legion," her mouth said automatically.

"And I'm supposed to trust you?" the man snapped. "Hiding around like this? Pretty suspicious. I don't like it."

She pursed her lips, though she was not irritated.

"I suppose you do not need to trust me," she said quietly. "Though I have no caps and no weapons. You can search if you'd like. I've only got a few personal items."

She opened her arms, and the man vaulted backwards, obviously on high alert. But he relaxed after only a second. The baggy coat she'd been wearing spread wider to reveal nothing but a skin-tight shirt that she was relieved she was finally growing into again. Her pants were full of useful pockets, but they were all loose and undone at the buttons, obviously not caches for hidden weapons, and her boots were so tight it would have been a miracle if she could hide a knife in there.

All that was left was her hands and her hair. Her hands, being empty, led the man called Boone to evaluate her face and hair. Her hair, which was tightly wrapped into a braided bun – her mother's favorite hairstyle – couldn't have hidden anything more than maybe a pin or two. All that was left after that was the necklace she had around her neck - her only, best, favorite treasure.

He'd likely reach the same conclusion she did.

Pretty plain, as girls go. Plain and harmless. A chink, he'd probably come to realize, obviously not somebody to pursue.

A little ruefully, she felt sheepish that this was always the way she evaluated her self-worth – by the way she looked. Some lessons were harder to unlearn, she supposed.

"How did you get here?" he asked her, no less suspicious than before.

She shrugged.

"Same way most people do," she said vaguely. "Walked."

"Most people don't walk unless they're moving with a caravan," the man accused.

She held out her palms.

"This is true," she said, "but I don't really feel the need to be with people so much right now."

"And anybody who says that usually has something nasty to hide," he snarled, advancing slightly.

Her physical reaction was instant and dizzying. Knees weak, arms heavy, she felt wobbly as she backed further into the dinosaur. He smelled of alcohol and sweat. Obviously, this was the end of his workday, and his eyes shone from exhaustion and – maybe, just a little – desperation.

Desperation was the tool men used to commit horrifying crimes, and she was riddled with fear.

The man, to his credit, noticed this.

"Get out of here," he finally ordered, waving his hand at her as he turned away. "I don't want to see you again. And believe me, I'll know about it."

"How so?" she asked him curiously.

He motioned to the gun on his shoulder as if this was answer enough. Her eyes flitted to it. A high caliber rifle, probably long-ranged. Her eyes flitted to his beret. NCR, she now realized.

He really was one mean motherfucker, and, rookie sniper or not, he could probably drop her like a Brahman.

That was when she remembered the Med-X, and the smell of alcohol. Her eyes widened as this information all clicked together.

"You're the lookout and you're _high_?" she asked, unable to hide her disgust now.

"Spare me the lecture, warden," the man snapped. "I get enough of it from everybody else."

"These people are counting on you – they're –"

"—and what the fuck do you know about it?" Boone asked louder than ever. "I wasn't gonna stay down here. I just didn't want to see my replacement, and..."

He seemed to realize he was explaining himself to her.

"I don't recall asking for your opinion, motherfucker. Get out of my face."

The luck of her arrival struck her now, and all at once she felt grateful that she had not died upon approaching. Again, she began to bow with her head, but she stopped herself when she remembered his last reaction to a bow.

"You're right," she said, stiffer now. "You didn't ask for it. I apologize."

"Just get the fuck out of here," the man snapped, waving his hand again to shoo her with a little more insistence this time. "This is my spot. Get away from here."

She watched him with a mixture of pity and frustration before finally sighing.

"I will take my leave then," she whispered.

Without another word, she backed away from the man until she was in the rain again. He watched her as she turned around the corner, eyes unwaveringly even as if he were a cat and she a mouse.

But when she turned to jog away, around the tail and out of the town, she only had to steel a glance back once to realize that the man had not followed her. What was more, nobody else had either.

And, just like that, she was on the move again. Homeless. Funny how some things worked out that way.


	2. Chapter 2

Two Months Later

The next time she saw him, it was somewhat of a deliberate accident. She was in Novac in search of a man called Benny who had taken something worth pursuing. It wasn't really the details that mattered as much as the history he'd found out, history she'd rather be kept quiet. The man in question, Benny, a name that was just sounds to her, seemed like the type to talk.

This Novac man, rude and callous as he was, was huffing across the courtyard, the sun at his side, casting a beautiful light against what she now could capably recognize was a toned chest and well-established arms. He was a built man, no doubt about it. And it looked like he was built for a reason the way his eyes scanned the horizon.

It made her a little frightened, especially when she found herself walking right into him without realizing it.

"Oh, I'm sorry," she began before perking up to see who it was.

_Him_.

Boone? She thought that was the name.

He recognized her too.

His eyes pinched from beyond the veil of his sunglasses, and she hurt with remembering.

It felt like a long time between then and now. She was still listless. Lost. But the despondency had washed out with the dirt on her clothes, and Good Springs had offered her a chance at a new beginning, even if it had also been an end.

She noticed his eyes flitting to the obvious scar on her left temple, and she found her palm brushing her hair in front of it to take his eyes away.

He noticed this too. Sharp man, Boone.

"What are you doing here?" he asked waspishly.

"I've left and come back," she replied to his question formally.

Her mouth became taut with the obvious lilt of her accent. Her words just didn't sound like his, and his words made her think of how far out of her depth she really was. For the latest time in a series of countless times, she ached for the tongue of her settlement back home, even as she knew she would likely never hear it again.

"Why are you here now?" he pressed.

She cleared her throat, considering how to respond.

"Because I'm tired and I need a place to rest," she replied calmly, offering him a polite, if weary, smile.

Her patience was different now than what it had been two months prior. By her own admission, this was because her tipping point had long since come and gone. Everything else now was just fuel to the fire. She didn't know when it would come, but it would.

Rudeness simply didn't help matters.

It fed the explosions of futures coming.

"We don't need your kind here," he barked at her dismissively.

He made to walk by her, and she laughed under her breath. This caused him to freeze.

"Sorry – did I say something funny?" he asked louder, causing a few people walking around them to gaze lingeringly.

She did not turn back to face him. This was too much respect, and he deserved none.

"I do not answer to you, NCR," she shot back at him. "I have saved this settlement from annihilation. Would you deny me a place to rest after that?"

It was true. She'd gone into that reactor and gone after more than her fair share of ghouls. Unsettling, to say the least, but there was money in bravery, and she was nothing if not tenacious.

He just snorted.

"Besides," she quipped, amusement playing on her lips, "what does 'my kind' do to offend you so much? Did you have family murdered by vicious tribesmen?"

She glanced over her shoulders. The tightening of the jaw at the mention of his family didn't escape her either.

He had lost somebody. She felt her heart breaking for him, and her amusement scurried. She more than most knew better than to joke about family.

To this, these revelations aside, he had nothing to say.

"It doesn't have to be like this, you know," she advised him, coolly now.

She heard him stop.

"My name is _Ren Ju Li_," she told him calmly. "I do not expect to learn yours."

He huffed off.

And when she couldn't sleep at night, she thought of him, tossing and turning in her bed. He was the first person to challenge her and look at her. There were raiders and bandits, sure, but they were akin to animals in their ability to contemplate right and wrong. All others had, for the most part, been up to this point very civil beyond Boone.

But he also seemed to see through her in a way that was both terrifying and exhilarating. By the same token, she seemed to look into his eyes and see him. He carried a great pain, and pain drew her to people. She was an empath. It could not be helped.

She wanted to see him.

Manny had told her he was the night watch at the sniper post. She decided to go see him. She'd be gone in the morning anyway, so it wouldn't matter when she was brushed away.

Cautiously, as she'd learned was right, her foot falls became silent as she ascended the stairs to the tower. She hovered at the door a few moments, imagining with each passing moment that he might burst through the door and swear at her.

So, deciding it was better to catch someone without pants on than be caught with one's own pants down, she opened the door.

"Goddamn it!" a loud expletive thundered out of the nest of the dinosaur's mouth.

She shut the door behind her and he stood tall. He'd been prone.

"Don't sneak up on me like that," he ordered, glancing reluctantly at her when he recognized who it was. "What do you want?"

"Your name."

"Boone. Craig Boone."

That was all she was going to get. There was about thirty seconds of shifting and dancing on the balls of feet until he lost it.

"Look, what do you want? I've got a job to do."

"We both know that doesn't mean much," she offered plainly.

His brow furrowed from behind his sunglasses, which he still wore in the pitch of night.

The corner of her mouth tilted upwards even as his scowl became more pronounced.

"I don't need a lecture, warden," he snapped aggressively. "We met _one_ time and it was a...bad night."

He glanced over his shoulder into the abyss of the Mojave behind him.

"Expecting visitors?" she questioned, crossing her arms.

"Yeah, I guess maybe I am."

He turned back to her and there was a moment in which he surveyed her. His eyes moved down her figure, lingering for a moment on her chest, which caused her to squeeze her arms more tightly around her in discomfort. But he did not seem lecherous or even devious. If the behavior was done, it was unconscious, and he looked further down her legs and back up to her eyes.

Whatever test she'd just been forced to endure, she'd passed, even if it was obvious she'd been found wanting in some areas by the look of distaste in his eyes.

"Not like you," he finally stated. "Maybe it should've been you I was expecting all along."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Why are you _really_ here?" he asked her knowingly.

"What do you mean?" she replied.

"You show up twice, up at night both times, this time with a scar on your forehead and a limp in your step. Whatever trouble is following you, the people don't need it here."

"How I conduct myself is none of your business," she defended confidently. "Besides, I intend to leave tomorrow. This area isn't entirely _friendly_."

"I don't have friends here," he breathed.

There it was. The anguish, the distress.

"I'm not from here," she offered as bait.

"No," he mused, bringing his right hand to his chin.

He rubbed the stubble there with a heavy sigh.

"Maybe you _shouldn't_ go," he said. "Not just yet."

She narrowed her eyes. She could recognize a cry for help when there was one. And something about his just seemed so personal.

"Why is that?"

"I need someone I can trust," he rushed out. "You're a stranger. That's a start."

The weight of pain she felt with those last two sentences nearly crippled her. She knew how that felt.

She _knew_ this man, even if he didn't know it yet.

She'd been through the same kind of tragedy she had.

Ju just wondered who it was he'd lost.

It didn't take long.

"My _wife_ was taken from our home by Legion slavers one night while I was on watch," he admitted in a rush.

And the _pain_ in that statement told her _everything_.

She opened her mouth to say something but found she didn't know what to say. She knew how the Legion treated women, especially those that had been _purchased_. Property, that's all women were.

Boone cut her off before she started.

"They knew when to come and what route to take, and they _only _took Carla," he continued caustically.

Her hand flew to her chest as the oxygen left her lungs. The cruelty of such an implication did not escape her.

"You think somebody…?"

"Someone set it up!" he seethed loudly, as if her horror was vindication of his hatred – and rightly so.

Tears welled in her eyes at the thought.

If Carla, his wife, had been sold, she would have been the only loose end to tie up here. No need to waste time on a bunch of other nobodies.

Ju wondered where Carla was now. Ju hoped Carla had had a good doctor, like Ju had been to so many who were taken by the poisonous Legion. Someone kind and compassionate, someone who was willing to take a few punches for the sake of a few extra seconds of rest for the downtrodden.

The thought of her treatment made Ju think this was treachery of the highest degree.

"Who could have done such a thing?" she asked him. "Can we get her back? I'll go with you."

There was a sneer on his face now as he abruptly turned away from her. That layer of pain was back. And it was mind-altering.

"My wife's dead," he ground out harshly.

The wind whipped her hair as what little control left of her faculties left deserted her, and her knees began to shake with fury on his behalf. All offenses on his part were forgiven. He was her fellow in this, in his loathing of the regime that had destroyed her entire life. They were the reason for her guilt and also for her listlessness. They were the reason she wandered.

"You want to get at the son of a bitch who sold her," she offered him bluntly, her voice raw with something that betrayed an emotion dangerously close to understanding.

Boone flipped around.

"How did you know?"

"What other possible end could you have with the Legion?"

The familiar distrust flared in his eyes before it died again in the face of his lust for revenge.

It was a quest she could honor.

She agreed to bring the man out in front of the nest while he was on duty. She had a feeling this would end badly, but who was she to judge?

Right before she left, she turned around. He spoke as if he knew of Carla's death, but if she'd been stolen, there was no real way for him to be sure. She asked how he knew.

And he just said,

"She's dead."

And that was that.


	3. Chapter 3

She snooped because that was what she'd grown up doing and what the Legion had driven her to do. Room after room was searched as days passed with no word between them, just significant conspiratorial glances and solemn nods.

A respect had cropped up around this task, and while he obviously still had a _lot_ of latent issues, he was less vile than he had been. Because now he had a story. That was what was important, really. Stories. His was that of a loving marriage. One woman, a local who'd been there for a long time, even had a picture of the two of them. Carla was astoundingly beautiful, not just in body but in her face as well. She had dark hair like mine, but she wore the dresses Ju had always admired from the outside looking in. Ju always wanted to try them on, knowing that doing so would probably just make her look like a child playing dress up.

Not Carla.

Carla had curly hair that billowed in waves over her shoulders, a large chest and wide hips. Her waist was skinny, at least, but the curves that met it were amazing, to be envied by the wee little people who existed in real life. Carla was something else. Completely unlike Ju, Ju found herself thinking.

A beautiful woman, even if her eyes had a glint of the pretentious. The other town's folk didn't seem to like Carla, and her picture seemed to show this. In fact, nobody Ju spoke to had anything good to say about the woman. Carla was miserable. Mean. She hated Novac and everything in it. She looked down her nose at everybody. She got along with Boone, but that was about it. She'd wanted to drag him away from here, bring him to New Vegas where she thought it was "safe." She changed Boone. Made him uptight. They could be heard arguing into the night just before her untimely disappearance.

Nobody had expected Carla's death, it seemed, in a way that was odd. She was gone one day, and nobody was the wiser. That day, Boone had left. Three days later, he had returned, empty-handed, tired and with that famous scowl he now seemed to have plastered to his features. They'd asked what happened, and he'd just said, "Carla is gone."

The story broke her heart.

Ju found herself disliking the town's people the more they spoke of her because it was obvious they didn't care at all that Carla was dead. They thought it perfectly reasonable to speak ill of the woman, despite her passing. Ju looked down at the picture of Carla and Boone. Carla was alive here, and she was Boone's, whether their marriage had been floundering or not, whether the woman was a piece of work or not. Carla was a woman, a living, breathing woman that somebody loved.

This seemed to be beyond the comprehension of Novac, but not beyond Ju.

Ju marveled at the smile on his face, at the not quite possessive but protective wraparound of his arm on the beautiful woman's waist. His smile betrayed some element of surprise, something akin to giddiness. He couldn't believe his luck, it seemed, just as the town's folk seemed to believe. He was smitten with her, or at least that was what the picture betrayed.

Ju envied him his happiness, and mourned with him for its loss, despite the fact that the other people in the town obviously wanted Ju to judge her according to their own opinions.

After the local had retreated back to her bed for the night, an older woman with a kind enough smile, Ju had snuck into the room and stolen the picture, careful not to fold it or to disturb it in any way. Boone would like to have the picture, Ju was sure.

It was the fourth day that Ju found the bill of sale. She was sick immediately after reading it. Physically sick. She ran outside, making it as far as the gate before vomiting onto the ground. Her knees shook and she found her eyes blurring with tears.

She wouldn't have believed it, had the evidence not been so irrevocably there. Had the meticulous nature of the thing been so real and life-like that she was sure beyond the shadow of a doubt that it was a true bill of sale. A real document, signed by a one M. Scribonius Libo Drusus and his et al.

She didn't know how long of a time passed before she began to run. She didn't bother to clean her mess up, not that anybody was out to stop her. There'd just been a sandstorm. She was the only one crazy enough to go out into it, eyes wet with tears, desperate to run as far away from that terrible document as she could.

She reached a small source of water. It was slimy, just like all water was, but water was water and that was what she needed. She didn't drink it, but she dipped her head in, wrenching the bun from her hair and breathing heavily, wondering when the seizing of her chest would stop. Her heart raced, and she said a prayer to Carla and her unborn "fetus."

The word sickened her. Fetus. So impersonal. So unreal.

When she returned, she didn't know how to keep her composure. She didn't know if she'd be able to. But she saw him, Boone, as he emerged from his home. Their eyes met and he surveyed her silently. She saw the minutest flinch of his eyes as he looked her over, and that was when he _knew_.

They both did.

The time had come, and she knew it didn't matter whether or not she _could _keep her composure. She just knew that she _had_ to.

Ju went to the woman. Spoke to her. Jeanie May – who was, all in all, perfectly civil. Sickeningly civil, in fact. Not sinister, not outwardly devious. Ju wanted to _spit_ on her, but she couldn't. Not yet. This was Boone's trial, not hers, and he would never forgive her if she took this from him, as much as she might want to. And Boone's opinion suddenly mattered.

Jeanie May's life wasn't hers to take. It was his battle, and all she could do was look in as she watched in horror the events that were to unfold in the closing hours of this fourth day.

Jeanie May wandered out in front of Ju, and she could tell from the older woman's eyes that Jeanie May was a little nervous. Guilty conscience.

Didn't matter to Ju. Not one bit. She almost wished that it did. She remembered this _hate_ like it was a sickness, and it rotted her insides in a way that was rapid and complete and agonizing. Every few seconds, a pang of anguish so intense would overcome her, and she was sure that this was the end. That she would die.

But she didn't die. Her legs and feet like lead, she moved slowly, not bothering to hasten to the woman.

The older woman turned to face her when they reached the rock.

"Okay, here we are," the woman said to Ju.

Ju scowled, feeling her hands reach into her back pocket to withdraw Boone's beret. Ju became acutely aware of the roughness of its material, of its worn nature, of the pride it had bestowed upon its wearer. She flattened it out of respect for the NCR and for him and for Carla, hating the woman as she fastened the hat on her head. It was a symbol of everything the Legion hated, of everything that Ju wasn't, noble, good, strong, steadfast. Despite the fact that the NCR hadn't been fast enough or good enough or willing enough to save _her_ village, Ju knew that the _idea_ of the NCR was something worthy of pride. She felt it as the beret fell over her forehead.

"What are you doing?" the woman asked, eyes flitting up to the beret on my head.

"I will pray that we learn forgiveness, _woman_," Ju spat.

And then, the woman simply wasn't there anymore.

Like Jeanie May had never been.

Numbly, Ju stood for a few moments, staring into space forlornly. She contemplated the morality of what she'd just done, but wondered if it was even possible for anybody to be saved anymore. It felt like the answer was no.

Unconsciously, she turned her eyes up to the man, feeling lost and vulnerable all at once, eyes searching blindly into the darkness. She was sure his scope was focused motionlessly on her face. Maybe he was going to kill her. End it here. That would have been okay. An acceptable final act, considering her last six months prior to this event.

But he didn't. Maybe he was the honorable sort. Or maybe he could see that this was personal for her. It probably wasn't a good idea that she'd been involved with it in the first place. But any barb against the Legion made her feel better, even if caprice took hold of her now.

What did it matter that the bitch was dead? Those they'd all lost would not return, and there could never be justice. Justice was an imaginary thing.

It was a lesson hard learned, one she thought she'd accepted a long time ago.

But it was obvious that the freezing cold blood that coursed through her was from this sadness, this _ache_, that just wouldn't go away, and Ju wondered if that would ever pass. If vengeance made it easier.

She would have to ask him, one day, if they ever met again after this. If he would give her the answer. If it gets easier. If it gets better.

Maybe it could wait. She just wanted to get out of Novac. Immediately.

Her feet trudging, she made her way listlessly back to the dinosaur, wondering as she wandered, step after step, finally reaching the door. She stood, motionless, wishing that she would cry to get the ugly inside of her out of her body. Ju wanted to flush it out, somehow.

Boone opened it before she could commit to these tears.

She saw his face was pale. His knees buckled and his hands trembled. There were tears in his eyes that she pretended not to notice, and he half turned back from her to allow her room to enter as they both stepped out into the wild darkness. She didn't like being so close to him, but it was clear neither of them really _wanted_ the proximity. It was just easier to talk in a space that was private.

"That's it then," he muttered shakily.

He exhaled. It, too, betrayed his vulnerability.

"How did you know?" he asked her, a hint of desperation in his voice.

There was a glimmer of hope in it that Ju was wrong. That this was a mistake, that he'd committed a murder due to his being misinformed. He wanted her to take responsibility for it, and she would, if that was what he needed. Lives like Jeanie May's were acceptable blemishes on her soul's permanent record, she thought.

But she had to give him the option to do the right thing.

Wordlessly, she reached into her pocket with ginger hands, producing the bill of sale that made her feel so sick to her stomach she wanted to just get it out of her – the memory of it appalling. Ju would do anything to forget that this had happened. She wished that she had ever been born if only it meant that these acts of vengeance were no longer necessary and that the Legion was eradicated like it had never been.

Ju motioned for him to take it when he did not, and he did so, hesitantly at first and then he clutched it, like a vice, fingers crinkling into the paper shakily.

His stoic face was placid against the onslaught of what I was sure was the most painful set of words he would ever read.

"I guess I shouldn't be surprised," he snapped. "It'd be like them to keep paperwork."

She said nothing still, knowing too well that this was so.

Disgusted, Boone tore the paper to bits, grunting as he thrust the bits into the windy air outside of the dinosaur's mouth.

She didn't know how long they stood before he seemed to remember himself, yanking her back to the present also.

"Here," he said, reaching down to a box.

He opened it and threw a rustic bag of caps at her.

"A hundred. This is all I can give."

He didn't thank her. She was glad.

Ju just scowled, turning her nose up at the money.

"I don't want your money," she snapped, a little more angrily than she ought to.

He looked surprised, like she'd slapped him. It looked like he would almost insist when he just shrugged, replacing the caps back where they had been.

"I think our dealings are done here then," he said dismissively.

But he didn't move. It was clear he wanted to know what she wanted. She didn't even know.

This was the part she knew well. The feeling of being lost.

"What happens for you now?" she asked him tentatively.

They didn't know each other, not really, and Ju wasn't sure if she had the right to ask this question.

But he didn't seem to mind. In fact, they seemed to be of one mind that they were in this thing – whatever it was – together now, and a few more spare moments of companionable silence between them would not be moments that were wasted.

"I don't know," he breathed heavily after a while. "I won't be staying, I know that. Don't see much point in anything right now, except hunting legionaries."

She felt emboldened by the gentleness in his voice, and for some reason she didn't want him to be alone.

"Come with me," she offered. "Let's go after the Legion together."

He knitted his brow. He didn't sound surprised. He'd already considered this.

"I thought you were after Benny."

"You remembered."

"You told me. Why would I forget?"

There was silence.

"You don't want to do that," he finally snapped with some degree of finality. "Be with me, I mean. I'm…not right."

He was self-conscious.

Sympathy was pungent and sweet. She just gave him a reserved smile.

"I understand," was all she said.

They met eyes. He believed her.

"In any event, I thought snipers worked in teams," she stated. "What will you do alone that you cannot do with me?"

A rueful smile played on his face now.

"Hm. Yeah. Working on your own, you're a lot less effective, that's for sure. I've been there and paid for it."

But, contrary to his words, he sighed, standing, grabbing a few bags from the box at his feet and stuffing it into his pack at the far end of the loft, like he'd been waiting for days for this chance. He probably had been.

"This isn't gonna end well," he warned.

She was already moving down the stairs, feeling underprepared now that he had a bag.

"Never does," was all she said to him.

With that, they were off into the night, going so far that they didn't rest until the sun was highest in the sky the following day. But that was okay. Because they were away, and that was all that finally mattered.


End file.
